056 - Using A Book to Tell the World Who You Are

The fact is that if you don’t shout out to the world who you are and what you do, no one is going to do it for you.

A book gives you the opportunity to stand out from the crowd, to position yourself as a specialist in something. It allows you to pivot into something new or expand beyond what you are known for.

Hi Guys! Nicole Gabriel here…

I want you to not just look at a book as a way to tell as story, but I want you to look at it as an opportunity to showcase or broadcast your gifts, identify your strengths, or further define your specialties.

If you look at the areas in your career where you are reiterating yourself you might find a book serves by giving you the ability to better automate the areas of overlap or repetition.

Let’s say for example, you are a chiropractor. You have a bunch of case histories you might like to share with your patients. This could aid them in healing, but it will also aid you as the doctor from having to repeat them. You can give patients a copy of your book with case histories in a chapter. This will not just give them details that may pertain to their care, but it may also give them comfort knowing that you’ve walked through a similar case before. This will give them peace of mind as it labels you as a professional that knows what you are doing and it literally documents that you care about your patients.

If you are a dentist you may have a specialty in restorative dentistry. Not only can you also have case studies but you might include pictures. You can also begin to identify areas of specialty that you could use to speak on. The book can help position you as an expert speaker at conventions or seminars. You can also use a book as an opportunity to begin phasing out of your day-to-day practice and into more coaching, consulting, or teaching of other doctors…perhaps a transition into retirement or hire an associate. Your book may be more geared toward a peer audience verses the patient.

In either of these examples you can position the content of the book for the patient or the practice. You might talk about what it takes to be both an entrepreneur and a doctor. You might talk about how to run a successful office, proper billing codes, staff training and management, or perhaps the pros and cons of adding supplementation or other nutrients to the practice or the best way to work in an associate or train staff. You can go about your business as usual or you can step back and away and use a book as an opportunity to analyze, reconfigure, plan,  or reorganize… identifying how well you are doing your business…using it as an opportunity to showcase your strengths and re-work your weaknesses. It can literally give you and your business the break you need to rework your plan and build a more successful roadmap.

You know, for a decade now my career has been about helping people become authors, but I also have a passion for both dogs and nutrition. I love to spend a lot of time in the kitchen making healthy vegan meals. Over the years many people have told me that I should write a cookbook. This endeavor is not for the faint of heart for sure! It would be quite an expensive and a time consuming undertaking and I’m not entirely sure it would be in alignment with my career as a book publishing coach and designer.

Though, I’m sure I’d have a wonderful cookbook I can’t find a practical application that returns the investment of time and money. This would have to be approached as a hobby really. But, if I decided to moonlight as a vegan chef in my free time perhaps it would be fun. Multiple streams of income are always nice, but I can’t say I care to move out of my day job. I really love what I do. So, this might be a great hobby book to let people know more about who I am, but I can’t say I’d have any clue how to turn it into a profitable business.

Perhaps you have something similar and always wanted to turn one of your passions into your day job?

A book will allow you that opportunity to pivot into that new thing. It’s not that the book automatically creates that new opportunity, but the book opens doors. It shouts out to the world that you are an expert in this one thing you’ve just written about.

But, the reality is that a book does nothing for you when it sits in storage somewhere in a spare closet in your home. You have to give your book legs. The best approach really is to have that thing you do and add a book to it. As they say in the business, you have to get out from behind your book. This is why publishers really only prefer to work with people that are go-getters and those that have a platform, audience, and day job that is already creating awareness. They want to make a profit of course. So, how you work a book into your plan should be equally thought-out.

I could probably make a case for a book in any career. In a corporate position you can use a book to instill change, leverage knowledge for process enhancement, or showcase your true desire for improvement with a well-thought-out plan. A book gives you a platform to speak from.  In a large corporation it can be hard to find your voice, but a book would most certainly get attention and may give you the needed credibility to move up the corporate ladder.

The fact is, you’re not a slacker when you write a book. A book is so much more than a story. It’s so much more than a message. It tells the world you are capable of organizing your thoughts, not afraid to broadcast your views, and it states you have a well-thought-out opinion or you’ve done your research. You’ve taken the time to write about something you find worthy of attention.

You’re a change-maker, a thought leader, and an agent of transformation. You have a voice and writing a book means you think enough about your subject to make a book a reality.

You can’t write a book if you don’t have at least 50,000 words to share about a subject. In other words, you have to know a certain amount of detail or have a strong enough opinion about something to pursue writing a book about it. Coming up with enough content and organizing it into a book takes time. No matter how much you know about your subject you will most certainly do some level of research before you put in writing your opinions or thoughts about your subject. You’ll want to stand solidly behind your claims. You’ll want to know what your competitors say.

It’s important to stand behind your words with credentials and build your reputation with high quality content. It’s as equally important to have a professional look and feel for your book. This gives your reader either the wow factor or the “nice try buddy, but better luck next time” effect.

So, what do you think? What do you want to be known for?

You know, as I’ve gotten older I’ve realized that what I haven’t achieved in my life is simply because I was either lacking a plan or lacking clarity. It’s far easier to get where you’re going if you actually know where that is. So, before you start writing, make sure you begin with a destination in mind. Make a list of your goals and objectives and then align your book accordingly.

Right now many of us are lacking a clear focus with the state of our world, but being a conscious creator is one of the most important things we can do during uncertain times. We have to be sure we are not succumbing to the negativity or chaos and we need to stay focussed on what we’d like to create. I truly believe if more of us can overcome the negative distractions with the purity of our positive and focused thoughts and actions we can manifest a beautiful today and tomorrow. Let’s hold each others hands and encourage one another. And with defined clarity and a little bit of faith we can move mountains!

OK Guys… as always - wishing you peace, love, and light!